Penn State enters Year 2 of probation as scholarship limits hit

UNIVERSITY PARK, PA.—It would be so much easier to explain if it were as plain and simple as those navy blue and white uniforms that have defined this team, this university, for so many decades.

So much easier if you could grab hold of something tangible and fight this unyielding beast with tentacles, this long arm of the law that reaches and squeezes hope from everything it touches.

This is the way the NCAA wanted it, you know. After Jerry Sandusky was caught, after the outrage of his horrific crimes grew, the only thing left for the suddenly scrambling NCAA was to make it all go away with unprecedented punishment on those picking up the pieces.

A little more than a year later, there was Bill O’Brien standing in front of his second team at Penn State earlier this week, a group of players stripped of championship goals and saddled with sanctions that will impact one of college football’s most storied programs for at least a decade. He’s talking about effort and determination on the first day of fall camp, about refusing to allow others to dictate what you can and can’t do.

“You’re going to hear people tell you that you have nothing to play for,” O’Brien says, his voice rising with each point he makes. “They’ll say we don’t have enough players; that we’re going to struggle. They’ll say we can’t win the Leaders Division. Bull---- we can’t win the division.”

He stops and looks at all those faces who have bought into playing at Penn State, who have willingly invested years of their lives in this place, NCAA sanctions be damned. He swallows hard.

He then turns and shows a 6-minute motivation video called the Death Crawl. Not a sound was heard in the massive meeting room while the video played; not a face veered from the screen that showed one undeniable truth that will save this program after a 17-month saga of who knew what and who said what and how in the world could it have happened?

You’ll never know just how good you can be until you give maximum effort.

Months earlier, the foundation for Year 2—the second of four years of NCAA postseason probation—was built with strength coach Craig Fitzgerald, a rock of a man who might just be the most important person in Happy Valley outside of O’Brien. The head coach can only see players so long; the strength coach has them when the coach can’t.

It was Fitzgerald who came up with this 16th Century idea for the 21st Century world. Back in 1519, Conquistador Hernando Cortes convinced a small group of 500 men to take the world’s richest treasure by overwhelming the mighty Aztec empire. And to make sure they would, to further motivate his men to fight, Cortes had his men burn their own ships when they landed in Mexico.

If they were going home, he said, they were going home using the Aztecs’ ships.

The Penn State players sat in awe while watching the Death Crawl video, each wearing a stark white T-shirt with the words “Burn the Ships” emblazoned in navy blue on the back.

“Something from my bag of tricks,” Fitzgerald said.

The message is simple: all or nothing—complete and total commitment. No matter the sanctions. No matter the scholarship losses. No matter the odds.

No matter how many tentacles reach and eventually create other problems.

Earlier this week, they were all together for the first time as a team, all 105 players crossing that blue line to the practice fields with the word “Focus” painted in white block letters. The NCAA allows teams to have 105 players on the roster, 85 of which can be scholarship players.

Penn State began fall camp with 65 scholarship players on the field and 40 walk-ons. Under rules stipulated by the NCAA sanctions, Penn State has until the 2014 season to get down to 65 scholarship players—and then must play four seasons (2014-17) at that number. That’s 20 scholarships under the NCAA limit for four straight seasons.

“Five scholarship losses (a year) would be critical,” says one Big Ten coach. “Twenty is the death penalty. They just didn’t give it a name.”

Technically, the Lions—who return 16 starters from last year’s eight-win team—could have more than 65 scholarship players this season. But a source told Sporting News the PSU administration wanted to get to 65 by the 2013 season for two reasons: to show the NCAA they were serious about abiding by the rules, and the hope that the NCAA would allow the program to begin the four-year run of 65 scholarship players this fall, thus giving the program one slight advantage in digging out from underneath itself.

Like there’s any advantage to paying for someone else’s sins.

“Why complain about it?” said Penn State linebacker Glenn Carson. “We can still control one thing they can’t take from us: we can win.”

‘IT’S A BAD DEAL’

Earlier this spring, something that happens at every school across the country played out in O’Brien’s office: an unhappy player decided the team wasn’t for him and he quit.

It is here where we introduce yet another tentacle. A clause in the NCAA sanctions, one not publicly paraded as all the others, allows players to leave the football team, remain on scholarship—and count toward the Lions’ limit of 65.

So when redshirt freshman offensive lineman Anthony Stanko left the team earlier this year, O’Brien lost another scholarship—this one for four years. Stanko was recruited by the previous staff, but O’Brien honored his verbal commitment, like he did with all players who committed to the previous staff.

Stanko is one of three players to have accepted this option; one has since graduated and another graduates in December.

“It’s his right to do that because of the sanctions,” O’Brien said. “But it’s a bad deal.”

It’s a bad deal because O’Brien can’t do what any other coach in the same situation would do when a player leaves: reward another player. On Day 1 of fall camp, O’Brien and his staff were evaluating film and one player kept standing out.

Deron Thompson, a walk-on backup running back and special teams player—a member of the 2012 Big Ten All-Academic team—has made significant strides since last season. He’s part of Penn State’s core special teams this fall, and could play some offense. But O’Brien can’t afford to give him a scholarship.

“Because of what happened here, that kid is paying a price,” O’Brien said. “And he had nothing to do with it.”

The story of Stanko highlights another unforeseen tentacle: Penn State can’t miss on recruits. While many programs miss on a handful of recruits annually; while many take chances on socially or academically marginal players, any miss at Penn State severely limits its ability to compete and further mortgages the future.

Even though Penn State has talent this fall; even though the Lions still will be a tough out for anyone in the Big Ten, the reduction of scholarships already has forced contingency plans. If Penn State loses a linebacker or two in the season opener against Syracuse—a thin position because of the scholarship limitations—it will be forced to switch defensive schemes. In the middle of the game.

Finally, something positive from all the negativity. If there’s one area where Penn State benefited from the adversity, it’s team chemistry. Those who stuck it out; those who stayed when they could have left without sitting out because of NCAA transfer rules (14 did leave), have set the standard for the type of player O’Brien and his staff must recruit.

So it should come as no surprise that when the NCAA hammered Penn State in July of 2012, two of the biggest recruits in the 2013 class—quarterback Christian Hackenberg and tight end Adam Breneman—stayed committed even though they were guaranteed to never play on a Penn State team with 85 scholarship players.

In fact, they remained committed and went one better: they started recruiting players for O’Brien.

“We didn’t sign to play bowl games,” Hackenberg said on National Signing Day. “We’re going to be developed by one of the best coaching staffs in the country.”

THE QUARTERBACK SITUATION

The future of Penn State was on display earlier this week, his strong right arm throwing darts all over the practice field during the first freshman workout.

The upperclassmen, who practiced for two hours earlier Monday morning, slowly began filtering out of the weight room later that night as Hackenberg began throwing. By the end of the practice, the sidelines were crowded with upperclassmen watching Hackenberg’s tight spirals fly all over the field.

This wasn’t the first time Hackenberg had thrown in front of the team; wasn’t the first time he’d flicked his wrist and made it look easy. He has been in State College since July summer classes, and has been throwing in player-led voluntary workouts.

An hour earlier, Hackenberg sat in a meeting room in front of a projector to watch film with O’Brien for the first time. They had talked about the offense for weeks while O’Brien was recruiting him, and now was the time to see just how much Hackenberg had absorbed in such a short time.

O’Brien pulled up game tape from 2012, and Hackenberg never missed while getting peppered with questions on defensive formations and corresponding line of scrimmage check downs.

O’Brien then rolled right into an anecdote about his days as offensive coordinator with the New England Patriots while discussing ways to be beat a Cover 4 defense. O’Brien told his new quarterbacks he’d never seen as much Cover 4 defenses as he saw last year in the Big Ten.

“I used to have this argument with (Tom) Brady all the time about throwing it across the field against a Cover 4,” O’Brien said, running game tape back and forth and focusing on the free safety and how his initial move at the snap is an instant tell. “You see this safety? He can’t get there every time; you can throw it deep over the middle. The more you train your mind to read the safeties, the more you’ll learn the defenses.”

The more Hackenberg learns to read defenses, the more he separates himself from sophomore Tyler Ferguson, a junior college transfer and midterm enrollee—and another member of the 2013 recruiting class. And nearly another unintended tentacle to the NCAA’s heavy hand.

Had O’Brien not landed Ferguson—he also had offers from Houston, Akron and FAU and signed with Penn State without ever visiting the school—Penn State would have entered this fall with one scholarship quarterback: Hackenberg. That’s one scholarship quarterback and two walk-ons, including Seymour and D.J. Crook.

By the end of the first fall practice, after the offense ran through numerous 7-on-7 periods and down-and-distance team periods, Ferguson had thrown more than 125 balls, when he probably would have thrown 40-50 in a typical practice competition.

“He was probably out there thinking, well, this is going to be interesting,” O’Brien said.

He’s not the only one.

PENN STATE: IT’S IN THEM

He has done everything fast all his life. When he was young, John Urshel’s parents couldn’t give him enough problems to solve.

From puzzles and problems in early elementary years, to linear mathematics and geometric equations as a young teenager, to any numbers problems they could eventually get their hands on. He has always raced through life faster and better than everyone else.

Never had anything less than an A in his entire academic career. Graduated from Penn State in three years with a degree in mathematics. Got his masters in four years, and will complete a second masters in mathematics education this year.

He taught a class last year at Penn State and will teach another this year, and he could have left for the NFL after last season. Now after an entire career, an entire life, of devouring everything as fast as possible, he’s taking in these last months in State College and slowly embracing every moment.

“Coming to Penn State, living here in State College, is the best thing that ever happened to me,” Urshel said. “Playing with my teammates, spending weeks and months and years in that locker room, can never be replaced. I love those guys. The bond we have, the things we’ve been through together, is so much greater than anything (the NCAA) can do to us.”

Maybe it really is easy to explain after all. Despite all the NCAA did to those who had nothing to do with what brought shame on this bucolic university town, they can’t take away what it means to play here. They can’t prevent two freshmen who were guaranteed acceptance to Harvard and Penn from instead enrolling at Penn State as walk-ons.

They can’t prevent a former Pennsylvania high school state champion wrestler, who had a scholarship offer from Purdue, from joining the long list of Pennsylvania players who will play for free because of their lifelong connection with Penn State.

Bill O’Brien calls them run-ons, these selfless guys giving everything to a program that needs anything.

“They’re just as important to this team as anyone else,” Carson said. “They sacrifice like everyone else—and sometimes more.”

Maybe it really is plain and simple and tangible. One man can’t take away a university’s soul; one organization can’t gut a program’s spirit.

“I don’t care what the outside world thinks,” O’Brien said. “All that matters is what happens here.”